I was driving along the freeway the other day and my mind was wandering, like really wandering, i got quite indepthly engrossed in what i was thinking about. I wasn't consciously driving at all, but i was driving fine, purely subsciously. I would say i was on autopilot. I have been driving for 13 years now.

Is it possible to play pool on autopilot ? say if you have played for 20 years plus?

Allan

01-12-2003, 10:33 PM

Sure it is possible for players to play on auto-pilot. I believe it is going to be a function of the quality of opponent you are playing against. Auto-pilot to me is a very basic fundamental working approach to the task at hand. So if you are playing an opponent who just cannot string together 2 balls to save his/her life you are basically on auto pilot. You just take the shots you can and you're never really worried about making extremely great safes or getting out of real tight spot because your opponent is so bad that you don't really need to be concerning yourself with it. You play a basic game but your mind is still on the task at hand even if just on a basic level......What happened in your car though is different that auto-pilot to me. My father in law is a therapist and he calls this "associative disorder" or something like that. You are completing a task but are so engrossed in something else mentally, that you aren't conscious of the task at hand. It is being carried out on a subconscious level, like your car trip. If you've ever seen the movie "For the Love of the Game", he certainly wasn't mentally involved in pitching his no hitter, but I would hesitate to say he was on auto-pilot.